“I used to work at the Ranch Club, a bar back home,” Freeland said during a recent appearance on MMAjunkie.com Radio (www.mmajunkie.com/radio). “These Army guys came in and thought they were big and tough.”

Freeland was there with his girlfriend, a friend and the friend’s girlfriend. The 5-foot-tall fighter who is preparing to make his professional mixed-martial-arts debut was drinking and having a good time. The visitors had continued comments.

“There was a pool stick next to me,” he said. “I’m hot-headed, so I took this pool stick, and I busted it over the guy’s head. [Freeland’s friend] was beating the other guy, and when the guy I hit got up, he had a big gash on his face.”

Such is the stereotype Freeland has been battling since he started wrestling in junior high school in Boise, Idaho. But the bar story – like others he shared – underline that he doesn’t like that certain word, and he has the chops to back up his annoyance.

Now, after 21 amateur fights (and a 15-6 record), Freeland is set to make his pro debut in a 145-pound fight against fellow Las Vegas resident Diego Melendez (0-0) at Friday’s Tachi Palace Fights 8 event, which streams for free on MMAjunkie.com. It’s a rematch of an earlier fight “Hulk Hands” lost by triangle-choke submission, a weakness for him because of his height.

But with a move to Las Vegas and a stronger dedication to training – twice a day as his full-time job – Freeland is trying to make a successful jump to the professional world while shutting up anyone who uses the “M word.”

If his training schedule is any indication, Freeland can handle the punishment. His favorite part? Sparring.

“I love getting hit,” he said.

Making a move

Freeland was a wrestler and football player beginning in junior high, but he eventually chose wrestling over his running-back skills and improved.

His connections in that world eventually would lead to a move and a new full-time job.

A friend of Freeland’s was a high school wrestling teammate of Johnny Nunez, who is a trainer at the TapouT Training Center in Las Vegas. He got in touch with Freeland.

“He said, ‘Shawn wants to work with a little person,'” Freeland said.

With that, Freeland had his invitation to train with Shawn Tompkins at the TapouT facility. He packed up his girlfriend and his daughter and moved to Las Vegas.

For awhile, he lived on Nunez’s couch before Tompkins liked what he saw and invited Freeland to move in with him. Freeland was happy to have found a consistent trainer – because he had faced some trainers who didn’t want to work with him.

“Yeah, a couple of them, I don’t know why,” he said. “I guess my stature. A couple did back home, but Shawn was more interested than anybody. That’s why I packed my bags and came to Las Vegas.”

Now he’s working to avenge one of his four amateur losses, which came against Melendez. Freeland remembers it as close for awhile with Freeland getting Melendez to the ground before Melendez put him in the triangle choke.

“I wasn’t training at the time,” he said. “This time I’ve been training twice a day for two months straight. He’s gonna get the best of this little man.”

The stature issue

Some parts of MMA are just simply more difficult for someone of Freeland’s size. Some might think he would prefer working on the ground because his arms aren’t as long, but Freeland insists he prefers the opposite.

“I love to bang; I love to put on a show,” he said. “Even though I’m shorter, it doesn’t really matter. I’d rather have the crowd see somebody get knocked out than lay on the canvas, so I’ve been working with Shawn on cutting the angles to where I can stand up and bang.”

He’s asked about his height a lot, and he insists he’s not the 4-foot-10 many believe he is. He mentioned he measured himself just recently and he was 60 inches (5 feet) and 145 pounds.

He’s been skilled enough to earn a three-fight contract with Tachi Palace Fights, which he hopes can turn into a bigger opportunity when those three fights are finished.

In the meantime, Freeland will continue to try proving that his size doesn’t determine his skills as a fighter, so he’s been training all aspects of the fight game at TapouT.

But, he also knows it’s a topic that will be discussed, and it has led to a few fights in the street here and there.

“Some of them in high school, I was suspended a lot,” he said. “I have some friends who like to go into the city to drink and chase women, and one night the bar was shutting down. Some guys were all interested, ‘This little guy, this little guy.’ Then they dropped the ‘M’ bomb, and that doesn’t go well with me.”

Award-winning newspaper reporter Kyle Nagel is the lead features
writer for MMAjunkie.com. His weekly “Fight Path” column focuses on the
circumstances that led fighters to a profession in MMA. Know a fighter
with an interesting story? Email us at news [at] mmajunkie.com.

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